Devastating news

Each year at the end of October just before cabin rates go up for the fall season, Todd and I take a few days away to rest and celebrate our anniversary. This year was no different and I especially needed it. So on October 31st we left.

We dropped the kids off at Grandma Liz's house. We made deep dish pizza for dinner from the food we had packed sat in the hot tub for a bit with some wine. The next morning my vision in my right eye was bad. It looked fuzzy. When looking at a page in a book it looked like pieces of letters were missing. I called mom who said it didn't sound like retinal detachment and I should call my eye doctor. He sent me to an OD in a nearby town.

We spent all morning there while the OD examined my eyes between scheduled patients. At the end, he said there was nothing wrong with my eye. He wasn't sure what was going on and we would need an ophthalmologist. We could go to one at the University nearby that afternoon or we could wait and go to one when we returned home.

Since the kids were already being watched we opted to go to the University. We thought I probably had retinal detachment which requires immediate surgery so we packed up all our things at the cabin, checked out, and headed out.

All afternoon the Ophtham. did tests on me - again between scheduled patients. I was nervous and scared because I hate surgery after having so many surgeries as a child. At 5:15 all test were done and he sat down with us. "I pretty sure you have Optic Neuritis. It means the optic nerve is inflamed preventing the message to get from your eye to your brain. 50% of the people who have this either have or go on to have Multiple Sclerosis." We were devastated. We left shell-shocked, drove back home.

On Nov 1st, we went to the see the recommended Neural Ophthalmologist in our town. Avrom performed the same tests - vision, Fields test, dilation... After 3 hours (he worked me in between scheduled patients), he said it could be and probably was Optic Neuritis... but an MRI was needed to verify any inflammation or lesions. He launched into the dangers of MRI's (it's more dangerous to stand in front of your microwave).

I was prepped for an MRI which strangely was performed in a mobile MRI facility parked outside the hospital. It was scary. I was in this tube with my heart pounding and no human contact for about 45 minutes. It is close quarters in those things!

Afterwards, Todd and I grabbed some lunch and headed into Avrom's office again. He looked at the films... we asked questions but he would only tell us that I had Optic Neuritis... nothing more. He went into the possible treatment but soundly described that studies have shown that using steriods did not return eyesight any faster or better than having nothing. He told us it could get worse before getting better.

We asked about the possibility of MS. He simply would not answer no matter how we asked or how hard we pushed. His office made an appointment for me for 3 weeks later with a neurologist.